


the sharp knife of a short life (oh well)

by arbhorwitch



Category: Big Hero 6 (2014)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Grief/Mourning, everyone is in pain, the narrator is never reliable
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-15
Updated: 2015-03-15
Packaged: 2018-03-17 22:38:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3546308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arbhorwitch/pseuds/arbhorwitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not surprising that he left a video in case of his death; it's that he needed it at all.</p><p>(or: hiro finds a file marked with his name, and it all goes downhill from there.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	the sharp knife of a short life (oh well)

**Author's Note:**

> "stop writing sadness" i say. apparently not P L E A S E let me write something happy for once 
> 
> also: second person pov is actually my fave and i missed writing in it so much 
> 
> warnings for angst bc that's the only thing my brain can produce apparently

_what i never did is done / a penny for my thoughts, oh no, i'll sell 'em for a dollar / they're worth so much more after i'm a goner / and maybe then you'll hear the words i've been singing / funny, when you're dead, how people start listening._

\- if i die young, the band perry ([this cover](https://www.youtube.com//watch?v=QQoFLrZ5C3M)).

//

You haven’t touched his computer in months.

It feels like a betrayal; he’s not around to stop you, but one of the biggest rules you had between the two of you was absolute privacy. You rarely went through his things, even before the fire—he shared nearly everything with you anyway. Occasionally you might have gone through his video files in search for movies you hadn’t seen, or indie games to curb the boredom during your years in high school. His first year of college had been a lesson in solitude for you—you’d take it now, if you could. The pain is still raw.

So it’s mostly an accident when you hack into his files through your own desktop, an array of old school folders and project names that are definitely not your own, and something in your chest surges hot and tight.

“If this is your message from the grave,” you start, but you trail off when your words echo back at you: words from the dead. Whatever this is, it changes nothing, and you’re not entirely sure you can reopen that wound.

You hit the power button on your monitor a bit more forceful than you intend, but it does the trick; the screen goes blank and you grab the nearest sweater, disappearing downstairs and out the door before the ghosts can follow you.

-

Downtown is where you end up, and you realize you’ve been running when you have to take a second to rest against the nearest wall and breathe.

You’ve been here before, the same curve to your spine and hands to your knees; the shouts used to carry through the alleys in the early hours of the morning and you begin to miss the thrill of the chase and the bruises fresh and terrible on your calves. Your shoes have lost all grip on the soles because of it—you can’t count on two hands the amount of times you’ve slid on rough pavement into trash cans, open streets, angry gamblers. You were never very good at running away, you think.

Lightning flashes in the distance and you feel the first drop of rain before the thunder cracks; you don’t recall a storm warning, but you dig your phone out of your pocket regardless, dialling a familiar number. Your hands shake, but whether it’s from exertion or something else entirely, well.

“ _Hey,_ ” the voice greets, and you breathe out a heavy sigh, relief flooding your veins. “ _Hiro, what’s up?_ ”

“I need you to come get me,” you say. “I’m by the McDonald’s in the commercial district.” It’s the only explanation you can give, and GoGo doesn’t question it.

She hangs up and you think you might really, really love her.

-

You both ride in silence, your arms around her waist and your face buried somewhere in the leather of her jacket.

The irony is cruel, but at least she doesn’t smell of aftershave. You don’t think you’d be able to handle that.

-

“Hiro.”

Your fingers are numb with cold as you pull away, and she doesn’t turn around but she doesn’t have to—her words carry over the quiet rhythm of the rain easily. The café is steps away but the ache in your bones keeps you from running towards it (or maybe away, always running away).

“I’m fine,” you tell her. She snorts, a quick shrug of her shoulders you feel through your entire being, so you add, “Sorry.”

She does twist at that, fire in the tips of her fingers where they brush at your hand, and she says, “Whatever it is, it’ll pass.”

Her bangs are getting long; she’s not wearing her helmet, and it scares you to think about. You try not to regret calling, honestly, but you haven’t felt this scattered since Callaghan and she’s got strength to handout like stars—she doesn’t give you sympathy, and it’s the only thing stopping you from locking yourself in the garage until your knuckles bleed with misplaced desperation.  

Eventually, you mutter, “Yeah, you’re right,” and it’s not nearly enough but you manage to climb off her bike anyway.

GoGo says, “Hey, I’ll be here at eight tomorrow. Your thesis could use an extra pair of eyes.”

You could cry; you don’t, because you’re not seven with scraped knees, but it’s pretty damn close. She’s giving you an opening, an offer hanging between the two of you in the sticky, wet air, and you nod.

“Thanks.” You breathe in, feel your lungs swell. “Tomorrow, then.”

She doesn’t drive away until you’ve closed the door behind you.

-

The second attempt isn’t much better. The dates on the files are like old film, memories you can’t seem to escape no matter how hard you try.

-

He used to call you reckless; he used to sit you on the edge of the bathtub with a first-aid kit in his hands and a frown on his chapped lips, prodding at your bruises and tending to wounds like you weren’t keeping him up on a school night, like he didn’t have a midterm in six hours. He kept his contacts, glasses, and sleeping aids on the last shelf of the medicine cabinet; you don’t have the heart to move them, can’t stand the finality of it. Looking back, you couldn’t have named the freckles on his neck or the birthmark on his right index finger, but now—now, you think you could.

All you have photographs and videos.

You’re so, so tired of this grief.

-

Two in the morning hits hard and fast, and all you’ve had to eat are a few soda crackers and half an energy drink. The taste remains stale on your tongue, and you contemplate waking up Baymax for company, but you don’t think you can handle the confirmation of your greatest fear: you’re sad, and you can’t fix it. You like the ignorance of it all.

But because you’re sad, whether or not you admit it, you do what you tend to do whenever your mind won’t settle. You work.

You type out eighty-one lines of code for an upgrade you’ll never use, and your eyes strain with exhaustion, but you don’t have to think too much; you flip back and forth between your history essay and your robotics in-class assignment, you write out a four page paper on the merits of a sentient toaster—something about burnt toast, undercooked bagels. You sit until your vertebrae crack with misery and your hands cramp, and then you stand up. The chair creaks against the garage floor and you’re dizzy with everything left unsaid.

“I just.” You close your eyes and grip the edge of your desk; he walked this floor once, too. You miss him _so much_. “Jesus.”

 _Fuck it_ , you think savagely, because you can.

You go upstairs.

-

It takes you longer than you’d like to pull the divider across, and then you’re face to face with everything you’ve neglected in the last few months. You wonder if your ease of grief is more of the buried sort, the lack of feeling simply because it’s easier; or if maybe you’ve healed a bit. You like to believe you’ve taken more steps forward than back, but it’s still a slap to the face.

“Sorry for this,” you say quietly, because it’s the least you can do. You dig out his laptop from under his bed—such a terrible hiding spot, you _told him this years ago_ —and carry it to your own desk, hooking up the charger with hands that are steadier than you’re expecting. You spare a moment to remember why you’re doing this; even if it’s the worst kind of closure, you’ll take it. The laptop boots up fast enough to keep you busy, and you enter in your birthday to access every file Tadashi ever typed out, every folder he named and everything he ever saved and god, you can’t believe you’re doing this, can’t believe you’ve made it this far.

And then you see it, a video file labeled with your name, and your breath shortens as you double-click the tiny pixel.

He says, “ _Hiro, I’m sorry if you’re watching this_ ,” and your ribs hollow out.

“ _I’m impressed you found it though. I doubt you’d want to go through my things, but… Hey, no harm done, yeah?_

 _“Except yes, because—_ ,” and here he breathes, this not-brother of yours, because all you can see is a very tired, very sad Tadashi on the screen. “ _Maybe you found it by accident. Maybe I’m still kicking, and I’ll be kicking your butt for snooping through my stuff when I find out. Or maybe not._ ”

The date on the file had been marked two days before your grade twelve graduation, and you want so badly to hate him.

“ _If not, then I’m sorry. I, uh, I know you don’t remember much of mom and dad, and I’ve been thinking a lot—that maybe if they left you something to remember them by, you’d see how much they loved you. So I’m gonna do it for you instead, okay?_ ”

You don’t want this. You don’t want your brother’s last words, don’t want the emptiness to flood your chest again.

“ _I’m proud of you. Graduating at thirteen? That’s incredible, Hiro. I always knew you were going to do amazing things. Please believe me when I say mom and dad would be so, so proud of you. I can’t wait to see what you’re going to do by the time you’re sixteen, eighteen, twenty. Here’s hoping I get to see it._

_“But sometimes life doesn’t always work out the way we want, obviously, since you’re watching this. So I guess I’ll say: I’m sorry, Hiro. And I love you, whatever you choose to do with your life. I’m sorry if I won’t be around to see it._

_“I hope you never see this._ ”

There’s a smile, sad and small and so, so Tadashi, and you feel frayed when your brother—your dead brother, your brother who _made you a goodbye video before your graduation_ —ends the recording. You wonder if he forgot about it, forgot that he said goodbye to you before he ever knew he’d have to; you wonder if it flickered through his thoughts when he looked at you seconds before running into the flames.

You whisper a belated _ow_ , rip it from your chest, and the rush of air in the corner of your room is the only anchor you have.

-

You realize, seven-thirty in the morning and the breaking of dawn through the cracks of your eyes, that it took you eight months to find something your brother planned to hide for years. The hate bleeds out, and you allow yourself this: overwhelming gratitude in the wake of your sadness.

Baymax doesn’t let you go the whole night. For the first time in a long time, you don’t have to pretend.  

**Author's Note:**

> [♥](http://arbhorwitch.tumblr.com)


End file.
